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[quote=Anonymous]Sorry to be that poster but: this is the wrong question.

Can you have a fulfilling life without kids? Yes.
Can you have a fulfilling life without college? Yes.
Can you have a fulfilling life without marriage? Yes.
Can you have a fulfilling life without [anything people get pressured to do to have the "right" sort of life]? Yes.

You can also do all of these things and feel unfulfilled.

I don't know the secret to happiness (I have chronic depression, lol) but I do know that there is no key thing that will make life worthwhile for you. The biggest part of fulfillment for me has been outlook and perspective. Something that helps me make decisions like this is to think of my life as though it is a biography I am reading. What are the themes, what is the character arc, how does this decision fit into this person's overarching story?

When I was on the fence about having kids in my early 30s, it sounded expensive and expected. Like something I was supposed to do but that would imprison me in a series of other choices (living in a certain sort of home, having a certain kind of job, having a certain kind of marriage). It wasn't a hard no because I could see what was good about it too, but it felt very limiting and I didn't want to limit myself in that way. By my mid-30s, it sounded like an adventure, a big and long project my partner and I could go on together, with lots of twists and turns and no clear path. So we dove in. Those were the narratives, that's how the decision was made. It was right because we made it right.

No one can tell you whether or not to have kids. You cannot crowdsource your life. My advice to you is that whether you have children or not, ask yourself what story you want to tell about yourself, and approach your life with an author's eye. Don't have kids because someone on the internet told you you'd never be fulfilled otherwise. But also don't NOT have kids because someone on the internet told you that you could be fulfilled without them. Write your own story.[/quote]

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